Sunday, May 07, 2017
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Right now, I believe that my statement that the "Macron defeat wasn't very unlikely" was incorrect, after all. It's still being predicted, based on partial results, that he will score a 65-to-35 victory over Le Pen. If something changes dramatically, I will revise or delete this blog post.

But the data available now do indicate that some 3-sigma fluke was needed so the probability of a Macron victory was close to 99.7% and the bookmakers have overstated the chances of a surprising result. I hope that Tom Vonk has kept his bet and won some modest interest. On the other hand, my condolences to John Archer who has made a bet on Le Pen.

As Le Pen has stated, a woman will take over France regardless of the result. It won't be Marine Le Pen – it will be Angela Merkel. Or Macron's teacher. Well, the statement that Angela Merkel has taken over France is a bit exaggerated. She has clearly supported Macron and she will benefit from the leader whom she called strong – exactly because she realizes that he's expected to be weak.

But there have been some disagreements between Macron and Merkel, too. For example, Macron wanted to help Tsipras and his comrades to make the Greek debt disappear. He will clearly be more left-wing than the German government fiscally – but the French people are more "relaxed" about these matters in general. And Macron is a former socialist rebranded as a centrist.

Also, France is going to be formally led by the second youngest man ever, after Napoleon Bonaparte.

However, he will bring similar policies vis-a-vis the European Union and migration issues. It will be a continuation of the Hollande years except that voices indicate that all this pro-EU, politically correct bias will become even worse in France – despite the fact that Macron likes to paint himself as less left-wing than Hollande et al.

Even moderate Czech political leaders such as the center-right ODS' Prof Petr Fiala mostly believe that Macron won't be good news for Czechia. He wants to increase the influence of the Eurozone relatively to the other members of the EU. Fiala's fellow partisan Mr Zahradil also argues that France will have the ambition to dictate policies e.g. to Central Europe. Macron also wants to impose the French minimal wages on foreign truck drivers which will be bad for foreign transportation companies.

Well, I don't expect too many exhilarating happy news but we have gotten used to such politicians, I think, and we may expect "more of the same thing".

In 2022, Le Pen or a similar politician may win if the Islamization and European-Union processes will get increasingly sour in the coming years, if the mass migration plus the terrorist attacks in Europe will get "revitalized", and if the European integration produces additional problems. In 2017, I would be about as likely to vote for Le Pen as for Fillon. Despite my disagreements with her economic and some other opinions, I think that the migration and EU-related troubles are a top priority for France. The results indicate that most of the Frenchmen don't think that the šit in which they have been thinking is sufficiently deep to justify the election of a candidate such as Le Pen.